A Little Bit Dangerous, But Baby That's How I Want It

Did the new Ariana Grande song nearly kill anyone else?

Aside from listening to this on repeat I'm getting ready to go to my cousin's house and planning Shadows Of Ourselves release stuff. Because I'm really excited for it to come out this month.

I'm going into workaholic overdrive trying to finalize everything. I wanna get paperbacks out within a few days of putting out the ebook because I want to host a few giveaways. I still need to sort out royalty info with the paperback distributor first, so I'm gonna stop by the bank today and deal with that.

Overall I'm just excited to have a longer book out. The longer the book, a better. I love really big stories, and Shadows of Ourselves is the longest book I've written to date. Blood of Midnight (which is free today!) and SOSAS are both novel-length, but they're still short books.

Also I genuinely think Shadows of Ourselves is the best book I've written, yet. I think it's got a nice flow and it's a pretty exciting adventure.

Plus, there's hot boys.

It's also set in my home town, Saint John, because it's a pretty magikal city, and because we need more books (especially hot New Adult romance books) set in Canada. The book is set in November, 2016, and it's a big romp through the city and a bunch of magikal landscapes.

It's also got a really diverse cast, because I wrote the book I wanted to read, and I'm sick of reading a book where everyone is cisgender and white and able-bodied. I want to write diverse characters in a way that they're not just coming out stories or coming of age or learning to cope with being othered by mainstream society - I think we should be able to see ourselves in books about werewolves and superheroes and detectives. Genre fiction where diverse characters are allowed to just exist and have stories and go on adventures.

I really loved City of Bones when I was fifteen because it was the first book I'd ever read like that with gay characters in it - not even just gay main characters, but gay characters period - and I think there's something wrong with that.

I really adore Amanda Sun's Ink trilogy because it has a gay character in its main cast, and I devoured half of the House of Night series in one week when I was sixteen because there were gay characters. (Token-ish ones, albeit, but still).

Rainbow Rowell's Carry On is (in my opinion) a masterpiece and Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo is brilliant. 

In real life, non-white teens and kids in wheelchairs and queer youth, they all do extraordinary things and there are so many facets to their lives - they deserve diversity that isn't shoe-horned in or gimmicky, and those are the books I want to write. Books where genderfluid kids get to take on super villains and teens in wheelchairs embrace their magical bad-assery and save the day, just like their counterparts do in other ya and na genre books like these. Because if stuff like giant robots and evil mermaids really existed, that's exactly what would happen.

It also deals with some pretty dark stuff like mental illness and substance abuse and, you know, death and murder.

I just didn't want to write a perfect, well-adjusted main character with a good attitude. I feel like there's so many young adults and college aged kids who are sick of seeing perfectionists who never mess up in their books. So many of us deal with mental illness or trauma or abuse, and even aside from those things, so many of us are a bit jaded and bitter, or emotional withdrawn. I wanted to write about and deal with those issues. Sky is pretty damaged.

I'm really fond of the book, though, and I'm hoping some other people like it, too. I'm just excited, in general.

Discussing YA: How Queer Characters Make Your Book More Realistic

Look, queer people exist. You don't have to like us, you don't have to want to write about us. But we exist. And if your fictional world doesn't at least acknowledge that we exist, it's gonna feel unrealistic, and at least a third of your readership is going to think you have ingrained homophobic tendencies. Seriously.

I can not tell you how many times I've had the immersive experience of a book ruined simply because it felt so unrealistic that every character in it was heterosexual.

And the thing is, you don't even need to write queer main characters. I mean, you should, yeah. Representation is important, and a big chunk of getting over ingrained self-hatred and internalized homophobia is about seeing healthy, happy reflections of yourself represented in fiction. But that said, if you, for some reason, be it personal preference or publisher interference or just the fact that you're one of those trash human beings who really thinks queer people are evil, don't want to or can't, write queer main characters, you can still include them.

Stephanie Perkins included two gay dads in Lola and the Boy Next Door, which created valuable representation and added a note of realness to the novel, but they were still minor, background characters. Kiera Cass mentions that girls can like girls without ever introducing a lesbian character in her book The Heir, and Marie Lu show both minor and major characters having same sex attractions without it taking up the focus. Jessica shirvington had a gay couple develop as frenemies, to friends, to lovers in her Violet Eden series, while only confirming it as romantic in the last book.

You can include diverse depictions of humanity's interaction with sexuality and gender without it being all about that, or taking focus from other aspects of your work.

Look, I'm not here to argue that queer people aren't evil. Why? Because it's 2016, and I don't feel like I should have to defend us in that way. If you're still hanging onto those beliefs, you're delusional, and I can't cure mental illness and paranoia through a computer screen.

What I can do is reason with you, so here's some reasoning: ignoring the existence of queer people, no matter what you think about us, both marginalizes a chunk of potential readership and also makes your art suffer.

It doesn't feel realistic to read a book where every single character falls into a straight romance with a heteronormative bow wrapped around it.

It doesn't feel realistic to read a book where every single character is just presumed to be straight when we know so little about them.

It doesn't feel realistic (or entertaining) to read a book where characters so obviously fall into a storyline or situation where an exploration of their sexuality or deviation from the straight 'norm' would make for a better journey or story, and watch it not happen.

I can name a slew of YA books where queer people just ... don't exist. Readers can handle queer characters. What's more, we want them.

A large fraction of your readers, even if they aren't queer people themselves, know someone who is gay, have a relative who is lesbian, are in a club at school with a kid who's trans, are talking online with peers who are asexual - if you think they aren't ready for this representation, or that they aren't actively interested in reading it, you're dead wrong.

There is no end to the benefits of writing a queer character, or having these conversations. At the end of the day, the only one you really need is this, though: we exist. We exist in the real world, and our absence in your books is out of place, a glaring elephant in the proverbial room, and it hurts the quality and tone of your work.

If you're too afraid to write queer characters because you think it will somehow bog down or ruin the entire book to have a gay person in it, you should probably be worried about your writing skills as a hole. Just saying.

5 Facts About Shadows

I finish the draft of Shadows today. In honour of that, here are five facts about this book! Oh, and don't forget to check out the Charmers tab at the top of the blog for more info!


1) It's dark. As in, lot's of angst, lots of danger. Drug and alcohol abuse, mental illness, emotional traumas. On top of that? A whole heap of monsters, some twisted romance, and a lot of action. I write a lot of dark stuff, and I got to show a bit of that in Things We Saw at Midnight recently, but I'm looking forward to seeing how readers react to a full length novel as opposed to a collection of shorts.

2) It's diverse. I really love diverse books. I don't love diverse books where the minority characters are treated as accessories or written as stereotypes, and I don't like books where the diversity feels preachy - I wanted to write a book that had trans and nonbinary characters, characters of colour, queer people, and characters with disabilities, without making them into caricatures. These characters' identities are just part of who they are, a normal part of their daily lives - as they should be.

3) It's hot. Remember when I mentioned twisted romance? Well, Shadows has heaps. Sky and Hunter are hot, full of hormones and angst, and oh yeah, stuck close together until they break the powerful magikal bond brewing between them. Sparks will fly - and so will clothes . . .

4) The book is in the New Adult genre. Sky is nineteen, and Hunter is twenty. The novel and series are set around adult themes, and are definitely not for the younger reader.

5) It's set in the city where I grew up. Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada - it's a hot damn mess of the grit and the glamour. Gleaming white spas down the hill from ugly ass dive bars, seedy strip clubs situated around the corner from top 40 radio stations. It's the largest city in the province, and it's a hectic mix of light and dark, hot and cold - the perfect reflection of the characters and story of Shadows. You can read more about it here: Saint John.

So, yeah, those are some things about this book that you should know. I honestly can't wait to share this with you guys. Aside from that, I also have the final quote I'll be sharing from the draft - as I finish it today, and then I'm letting it rest for a few weeks before edits start.

That doesn't mean I won't be working, though - I'm also doing nanowrimo this month! Feel free to add me!

Surprise!

I put out a new book today - and it's free! The new book is called Things We Saw At Midnight, and it's a collection of thirteen short horror stories and vignettes set in a fictional Nevada town called Midnight City. It's got griffins and doppelgängers, phantoms and visions. It's even got a personification of nostalgia.

In Midnight City, things are a bit odd. Old Lady Ellen knows when you're going to die, the man with a swarm of bees where his face should be always sits in the same booth at Winston's Pies, and the local gas station attendant is a leftover deity from another dimension. But in the dark heart of this desert city, fear lives like a sentient creature, waiting to claim anyone it can. Will you survive?

Things We Saw At Midnight is diverse, humorous, and hopefully pretty damn scary. I wrote this book as an early Halloween gift to all my readers and online friends, as a way to say thank you for embracing me and my work and encouraging me to keep creating.

you can grab an ebook on Smashwords here: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/584827
Or read it on Wattpad here: https://www.wattpad.com/story/51850761-things-we-saw-at-midnight
And, add it on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27181294-things-we-saw-at-midnight

A Darkness So Divine Trilogy Details + Cover Reveal!

So, a few days ago, I posted the covers for the A Darkness So divine trilogy on my Tumblr:

The trilogy is a spin-off of the Lilac Jones Adventures (which are currently free on Wattpad) but where TLJA are lighter young adult stories for younger readers, ADSD borders on new adult, and is much darker. It still has a grim, kind of snarky, sarcastic humour to it, but the characters are older, more mature, and dealing with much darker issues than Lilac did in the prequel.

Book #1, The Diamond Society, sees Lilac moving to the tiny town of Northbank, New Brunswick, with her recently divorced mother, for a fresh start. But Lilac soon realizes that the tiny town is anything but quiet: Northbank is home to a quietly seductive group of paranormals, each harbouring their own secrets and powers. . .

Lilac is quickly caught up in the lives of two local teenagers: Jesse Holmes - the town outcast who may or may not be an incubus; and Hadley Snow - resident popular girl and part-time Valkyrie (who might have murdered her summer fling . . . oops!) As Lilac and the teens go to desperate lengths to uncover the secrets of Northbank and ensure it's future, they're forced to contend with a dark power brimming beneath the surface of their quaint home that, if left undefeated, could destroy all them. . .

Book #2, The Winter War, sees each of the main trio discover more about their inherent powers and histories while their present relationships develop and grow, all while startling revelations change everything, and a desperate war looms in the horizon. . . Book #3 The Chain of Thorns, concludes the trilogy as new enemies converge on the town and the trio must band together to save everyone they love from certain death. . .

In my mind, the series is akin to The Vampire Diaries, The Mortal Instruments, and The Nine Lives of Chloe King. I really love urban fantasies, and for this trilogy I'm drawing inspiration from some of my favourites, like My Blood Approves, Daughter of Smoke and Bone, and Dangerous Creatures - essentially, it's my take on one of the teen supernatural dramas I loved as a younger teen (and still occasionally binge-watch!) and putting it in a setting I can relate to.

I grew up in Saint John, which is the largest city in New Brunswick - but I also spent time living in rural areas of Hampton, and now live in a municipality outside the city limits. In Northbank, I wanted to incorporate the feeling of small-town life in New Brunswick, capturing some of the isolation and boredom, while also showing the dynamic relationships between the locals and some of the more lively sides of the community. I've drawn from a lot of real-life experience in outlining the town and the settings the characters interact in, and I'm excited to bring those to life and use my own reality as an inspiration for how they feel on the page.

I also really wanted to capture how interesting and vivid the lives of teenagers going on. How these young people have such dynamic inner-lives, and so much on their plates; and what happens if you throw in a dash of magic and personal tragedy? What happens when they're dealing with grief and growing up and fighting evil? They all fit into certain archetypes: Lilac, the loner; Hadley, the popular girl; Jesse, the rebel. And their relationships with each other and their parents, friends, and love interests shape their story. I also embraced the diversity of Canadians in writing them, and I'm excited to bring more representation into the genre.

All in all, ADSD has been a lot of fun for me, so far, and I'm really excited for it! But I'm done plugging myself, and I should get back to work, so I'll leave you with this new footage from Shadowhunters!

Pop Culture is Killing Me

I feel like my blogs have been really dark and personal lately, and while it's important to me to talk about personal stuff to form a connection with my readers and show who I am, I also feel like it's fun to keep stuff light and recap-y and, well, bloggy. And I like talking about pop culture. So much that it's almost all I do.

I'm working on a side project right now while I take a short break from everything, and it's just something to take my mind off stuff when I crave the motion of typing or thinking about storytelling. It's just an expanded version of a short story I wrote almost two years ago, but it's in a different pov and verb tense, and it's bery Richelle Mead. Or, well, as Richelle Mead as I get - my writing is a lot more mope-y and emo than hers, but still.

Anyway, while I'm writing I'm collecting a bunch of good music, bust last night I stumbled across Same Old Love by Selena Gomez and I'm loving this song. It's different than anything she's done before, but still familiar. I like that there's an electronic element, but she's letting it be pop. She's not forcing it to be a dance track and it's really glamour. There's something almost Amy Winehouse about it, and I love it. I've had it on repeat for an hour while I cooked eggs and fried mash potatoes for breakfast. Also coffee, because coffee.

It really fits the story, too, because the main character and her love interest are both the kind of girls who like to wear glamorous dresses and give sass. This is ya paranormal, but it's so chick-lit it's one of the funnest things I've ever written.

I'm also really loving Dangerous by Big Data, even though the music video grosses me the hell out, and Coattails by Broods.

I'm reading Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo, and I'm worried because there's so much to read I don't know if I can get to all my arcs in time! I don't want to waste the arcs, but these book shopping sprees might have me knee-deep in catch-up with my actual books so long the ebook arcs expire.

expensive habits...

I did just read a physical arc of Pretending to be Erica by Michelle Painchaud that her publisher sent me, though, and I have to say - I loved it. You can read my review of that here. I really like heist stories, so that was nice, even if it was more contemporary. But Michelle Painchaud is awesome on Twitter, and her book is full of some pretty awesome stuff too. Like cute boys and emotional trauma. That kind of awesome.

Right now I'm just hoping my royalties pay out soon because as soon as I get my next payment I can buy a new laptop off of kijiji or something and pick up the pace with work. I desperately need a new (well, new to me) computer, because mine is nearly six years old and ready to retire. Once I get a new one I'm hoping I can work more and do more as far as youtube videos and blogs and stuff go. I can also do more with Diverse Tomes, which would be nice.

As it is, you can find Diverse Tomes on Facebook and Tumblr now. It's a platform I use to talk about and dissect diversity - or the lack of it - in the young adult genre, and in other teen oriented culture. So that's cool, and you should probably check it out.

What else? I haven't had a red bull in so long that it's killing me. It's raining today and I'm going to light some incense and make coffee and do homework when I'm done writing this. I'll be writing and posting another blog earlier because I should post on this blog more. When I'm done homework I'll probably work on that project I was just talking about for a bit. And then crash.

Keep an eye out for a post on becoming a beta-reader or recieving arcs of this project because I want to put some out as soon as I finish it.

(I'm hoping to squeeze in one more release besides SOSAS in 2015, because Shadows doesn't come until 2016, ditto another project I can't talk about yet.) And then I have two books coming out in 2017 as well - a duology. After that I'm up in arms. I might aim for traditional publishing with anything after that, but we'll see how it goes...